Torrential Rain of Fire
by Strikepenguin5
Summary: Short story, first person POV. A Jade Falcon raid during the Civil War spills into a city and drives a man insane. (Very Depressing) R&R,pls.


_Torrential rain of fire…_

Torrential rain of fire… 

            "Camel one-one.  Camel one-one.  Enemy units incoming.  At least a star of Clan Omnis, with Elemental support."

_Blood-drenched fields._

_Blood-drenched fields._

            "What?  How did they get past Alpha?"

            "They blasted through.  Protect the city!"

_Blood-soaked streets._

_Blood-soaked streets._

            I moved my 'Mech through the downpour, conscious of the fighters that swooped and dove overhead, clashing even in this miserable weather.  Snug in my cockpit, I looked to the left and right, just to make sure my _Jagermech III_'s arms weren't smashing through the buildings on the outskirts of town.  I opened the beam on my radio, trying to figure out exactly where the clans were coming at us.  The medic channels were clogged.  Command was having a hell of a time logging the separate requests for air and artillery support.

            "Camel lance, keep up.  I don't want to get caught by a star of clanners by myself."

            "The hell happened at alpha?  We had two assault companies stationed there."

            "Quiet, Camel two."

_Blood. _

_Death._

_Destruction._

_Devastation._

            The first enemy unit appeared like a ghost out of the mist.  Its mottled-green paint job made it look like an avian swamp-creature in the downpour.  A _Vulture_.  Furious, bounding movement at its feet revealed the presence of elementals.

            "Incoming!  One Falcon _Vulture_, plus Elementals."  I stroked the triggers on my joysticks and impaled the Clan omni with a pair of azure lightning bolts and thunder from my ultra autocannons.  Armor shards spalled everywhere, tripping up several of the elementals as they advanced forward.  The _Vulture_ recoiled from my opening shots, then fired back, pulse lasers flashing steam and armor off my battlemech's hide, missiles corkscrewing and blasting more protection.  

            The _Vulture_ bore scars from its contests earlier in the battle.  I watched, fascinated at the sparking of actuator packages and the green dripping coolant from the 'mech I had just savaged.  The neon-green of the coolant looked like the flesh of the Falcon 'mech running off onto the ground.  It fired its pulse lasers at me again, and I fought to keep the _III_ upright.              Finally I heard the clank of ammunition spinning into place.  I let the clanner have it with double-bursts from my autocannons.  I advanced on him, firing my lasers at their longest range before cycling into my PPCs.  One of the twisting blue beams flashed into his left torso.  Smoke and fire and then a massive explosion blew the entire missile pod off.  The accompanying arm went cartwheeling into the side of a building.  Unbalanced, the _Vulture_ fell heavily on its other side.  

            "Camel lance, those Elementals are getting really close."  I radioed, backing away from the steadily bounding targets.  They bounded towards me on their miniature jump jets, ready to take my mount apart piece by piece.  

            A laser hit nicked armor off my _Jagermech_'s right shoulder, another one took some armor off the leg.  I took another tiny hit and another, and then a cloud of missiles peppered armor everywhere.  

            "Gahhhh!"  I screamed as a single SRM impacted on the _Jagermech_'s turreted head.  The impact tossed me into my restraining straps, then back into the coldness of the command couch.  I banged my right elbow hard on the metal frame, sending tingling pain up damaged nerve endings and right into my brain.  

_Darkness._

_Pain._

_I feel it in my bones.  It rots them._

            "Damned Elementals."  I raked their approaching line with my autocannons, sending armored bodies flying through the air as the heavy shells punched through the armored suits.  I incinerated one of the survivors with a PPC hit, and the little demon exploded, flash-fried into imploding his own suit.  I was trying to get the targeting reticule to lock on the last bounding target when something hit me.

            I looked up through the shattered glass of my cockpit to see a battle-scarred, crouching _Vulture_ with wreathes of smoke wafting from its remaining missile launcher.  It swung its twin-barreled arm towards me and amputated the _Jagermech III_'s left foot with its strobing pulse laser.  

            I posted off my right arm, then smashed the leg-stump into the ferrocrete beneath my 'mech.  As I finally rose up to the usual height, I fired.  My left-arm autocannon thundered and roared, while my right-arm AC spun and sparked and whined.  It could have frozen up from the ultra firing mode, it could have been damaged from when I tried to get up, it could be both.  The _Vulture_ convulsed as tracers screamed into its torso.  One of my PPC beams whipped into the building the clanner stood next to.

_Oh God._

_Not this._

_Not now._

            I watched in horror as the coruscating azure particle beam ripped out a whole section of the multi-story building and sent the rest of it sliding right down onto my foe.  The tide of debris swept the _Vulture_ into the building on its other side.  Something exploded, either the 'mech or a gas line or both, and debris rattled my battlemech from top to toe.  The explosion was so bright I had to look away.

            When I returned my gaze, there was a ragged doll wedged into the crater-riddled viewscreen.  Clutching it was a single, tiny human hand.  

_I like this room._

_It is the room I wake up to._

_It is the room I return from that hellhole._

_It is clean and white, and the people who pass through the window smile sometimes._

_I wake up sobbing._

_I go to sleep sobbing._

_They make me eat._

_I haven't really stopped crying since I shut down my trembling 'mech, locked the knees, blew the cockpit hatch, and jumped._

_I'd explore this pristine white room if I could, but my leg's still fused together._

Glowing tidbits of 'mech and building and who knows what else drift down from the sky like feathers.

_Torrential rain of fire._

_Misting rain of blood._

_I can't seem t put them out with my tears._


End file.
